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Today's big stock-market selloff during the first trading day of February is stoking discussion about whether now is the time to buy the market's big dip.

With the Dow Jones Industrial Average down 7.3% this year to a three-month low, Bank of America stock strategist Savita Subramanian said some marquee names with global diversification look cheap after several days of losses.

"I do see this as a great buying opportunity for some of the higher-quality names in the S&P 500 that have sold off on emerging-market exposure," Subramanian said on CNBC Monday. (She didn't mention those names.)

But Barry Knapp, the head of U.S equity portfolio strategy at Barclays, remained unconvinced that the market presented smart buying opportunities just yet. But he said that he could change his mind if the S&P 500, which closed Monday at 1,742, falls to 1,700.

Historically, the U.S. stock market sees an 8.5% decline after the Fed begins to normalize monetary policy, Knapp said. Once the market sees that decline, he said, stocks should bounce back.

But while stocks have proven to be a troubling investment in recent weeks, particularly emerging-markets stocks, the investment returns for January make it official – bonds have confounded the conventional wisdom.

While many high-level investors in the pages of Barron's and elsewhere have been eulogizing bonds because of the expectation of rising rates, many bond categories have gained value in the past month while stocks have fallen, according to the blog Capital Spectator.

Capital Spectator

When an asset gains a percentage point or more in a month, that's decent performance. And last month, U.S. bonds, as measured by the Barclays U.S. Aggregate Bond index, gained 1.5% while Barclays Treasury TIPS gained 2.0%. Even riskier junk bonds, as measured by the iBoxx High Yield bond index, gained 0.6%.

It wasn't long ago that the many pundits were predicting doom for bond prices. The moral of the story is that anyone constructing a portfolio for the long run should not abandon a classic building block category such as bonds.

As Marketwatch columnist Chuck Jaffe puts it, "it's a good reminder that no matter how hot or cold the market gets, spreading money around into different asset classes makes more sense than chasing what's hot."

Jaffe poses the question: What should investors do now that bonds don't look that scary?

"Most experts suggest that the change—particularly because the thinking on bonds has turned so quickly—shows the value of having an allocation plan and sticking to it, " he writes. "Even though bonds look more attractive than expected, the only reason to load up now would be that your portfolio doesn't have enough bonds to begin with."

Bespoke Investment Group

Though the stock market has experienced a sharp pull back since the beginning of fourth-quarter earnings season, "the average stock that has reported so far this season has gained 0.39% on its report day," Bespoke writes. (For companies that report in the morning, we use that day's change. For companies that report after the close, we use the next day's change.)

"When the market falls this much during earnings season, the average one-day change for stocks that have reported is usually very negative. But this season companies have averaged gains when they have reported, even as the rest of the market has plummeted,'' adds Bespoke.

"This tells us that on a micro level investors have been pleasantly surprised by what they are hearing from individual companies. Unfortunately, macro factors have been outweighing the good micro news and investors are just unwilling to own stocks in general right now. Earnings are the ultimate driver of stocks, and in our view, the fact that stocks are going up on their report days this season is a good sign for the long-term health of this market."